THE CASE OF THE MISSING WIFE

THE CASE OF THE MISSING WIFE…………
(Sweetheart just file this case under ‘Three men on a pogo stick’)…
Sweetheart,, is my secretary Gretchen Holly,, she’s a swell
enough gal,, if you like 20 something blondes with 42 inch
bulkheads popping out of their dresses,, but I really hired her
because she makes great coffee,, and once a couple of years ago
she made me some breakfast,, two burnt pieces of toast with
runny eggs,, the best I’d had in months…I was to learn years
later than it takes a lot of skill to burn toast as well as she does…
I guess that’s why I hired her,, that and the fact that her uncle
gave me twenty bucks…I’m always a sucker when it comes to
dames and a quick twenty… (Dollface,, if I’m going to fast for you,,
just rewind the tape and listen to it again)…My name is Sam Edaps,,
private eye,, at least that’s what it says on the door…I’m in my
3rd floor office in downtown Los Angeliess,, dictating the case
I call The Missing Wife…

It was a month or so ago that I was contacted by a
Mr. Frank Skitbottom,, he called and asked if I would be available
to look for his missing wife,, he said he was concerned for her safety,,
he mentioned that she had been gone for two days now,,
and hadn’t told anybody where she was going…I agreed to meet
Mr. Skitbottom at his place the following day around noon,,
I figured maybe I could get a free lunch or at least a couple of
free drinks out of him…

Wednesday turned out to be a cloudy day in Los Angeliess,,
as I drove the 30 miles to San Pedro…The expressway was
crowded as always and I arrived at Mr. Skitbottoms’ estate a
little after 12:30…Mr. Skitbottoms’ estate was a rambling affair of
bungalows and a Georgian style mansion with the ever present
Pimento palm trees lining the drive way…I parked near the front
door and decided to leave the convertible top down,, maybe the
smell of leftover pizza,, I’d left in the backseat a week ago,,
would clear up a little,, I just hoped that the seagulls and pigeons
wouldn’t leave any surprises for me when I got back…
But that was a risk I was willing to take…I grabbed my 45 from
the glove compartment and headed to the front door…A butler
named Clevies met me there and escorted me to the rear terrace
to meet with Mr. Skitbottom… The house was the usual affair for
a Georgian mansion…All tile and white columns with a three story
staircase…(odd since the house had only two floors)..A couple of
bronze statues of naked women and paintings by Karl Marx
immediately caught my attention… This could be a real money
making case for me,, if I strung it out long enough…

Just had to play it cool and calm…

Mr. Skitbottom was sitting in the shade,, flanked by two meatball
bodyguards…They gave me the usual look-over and patted
me down,, making sure to squeeze my gahoneys just to be
annoying…I didn’t tell them my gahoneys were shot off during
the war,, didn’t think it would make any difference,, they seemed
to be enjoying their little game of patty-cake too much…They took
my 45 and placed it on a table next to Mr. Skitbottom and then left
us to talk alone…
I hoped I’d get my 45 back,, it wasn’t loaded anyway,, I just use it
to scare away mimes and Hari Christna nutsos at the airport…
Mr. Skitbottom was a rather large man,, I guessed he was about
425lb and to be about 4’10,, he was wearing a white fedora and
a white linen suit with a plaid silk shirt,, he had pink bunny slippers
on and wasn’t wearing any socks… I’ve always been suspicious of
men who don’t wear socks,, so I needed to be extra careful…
The terrace was covered by the second floor which extended out
from the main house and was supported on what I could only assume
where white marble columns with naked Puerto Ricans chained
to them,, stolen from some museum I supposed…

There were four macaws in the corner eating peanuts and leaving
their white calling cards on the tile below,, and as always the ever
present Palma granite palm trees surrounded the terrace…
Mr. Skitbottom was a man of business and he came right to the
point,, the first being my fee,, I immediately lied to him asking for
5 times my going rate plus a daily expense account and gas money…
His laughter at my proposed rate was no surprise,, I expected it,,
it was only the fact that he laughed for fifteen minutes and his
private nurse had to be summoned to give him some oxygen
that bothered me…( I was surprised that she was a nurse,,
because I didn’t know they wore skirts that short,, or maybe it was
the red fishnet stockings that didn’t quite reach to the top that
gave me doubts)…We finally agreed to 50cents on the dollars with
10 dollars a day expenses and I’d have to give him receipts for
the gas,, seems he was having some tax trouble with the local IRS,,
and needed as many deductions as he could make up…I found this
to be a little strange,, since Los Angeliess IRS agents can always be
bribed quite easily…I accepted his offer,, I would have settled for
10cents on the dollar…

Mr. Skitbottom then told me about his wife,, he said she had been
missing since Monday,, he feared that maybe she had runoff with
the pool cabaña boy…this was odd,, considering the fact that his
mansion didn’t have a cabaña or a pool…But I let it pass and let
him continue…He told me that they had only been married about
six months,, they had meet at a limbo party at the mansion of
Mr. and Mrs.Crypso,, over in Bakersfield…I doubted his story,,
I found it very hard to believe that a man of his size could even do
the limbo,, he continued to inform me that he fell in love with her
from the first moment he saw her naked in the hot tub,, and that
they were married two weeks later…I then asked him for a
description of his wife and the cabaña boy…He gave me a recent
photo of her,, she was a striking young women of about 25 or so,,
with jet black hair and not a bikini line on her,, I was kind of shocked
that he would give me a photo of his wife naked on the bed,,
but he explained that he wanted me to clearly see the parrot tattoo
on her inner thigh…He also mentioned the diamond necklace and
diamond bracelet she was wearing,, he said it was a family heirloom
and that she never took them off…I figured this was the real reason
he wanted his wife found…He couldn’t tell me much about the
cabaña boy,, except that he thought he was Cuban and gave private
rumba lessons in San Miguel…I was sure that he did…

My meeting with Mr. Skitbottom lasted only about 1 hour or so,,
I didn’t get a free lunch or even a free drink…I now doubted that
I would ever get paid…Towards the end of our meeting on
the terrace,, it had started to rain,, a typical California rain shower,,
it only lasted ten minutes or so…
I put the photo of his wife in my coat pocket,, and retrieved my 45
from the table,, Mr. Skitbottom,, started to object about my leaving
with his wife’s photo,, but I assured him that I needed it to find
the tattoo parlor where she got the parrot tattoo…The butler
Clevies escorted me back the way I came,, to the front door…
Opening my car door made an immediate impression on me as the
rain water soaked my shoes,, it would be a long squeaky day for me…
As I drove away,, I could see Clevies give me the universal
goodbye gesture,, for leaving wet cigarettes,, wrappers and foam
cups in the driveway,, as a private eye you learn to live with
such things…The drive back to my office was like I knew it would be,,
soggy and wet,, the seats were covered with dripping seagull
messages and the pizza stain in the backseat was an even
bigger mess…I stopped at the nearest gas station to fill up and
also filled up the gas cans I keep in the trunk,, I made sure to get
a receipt,, there was still a chance that Mr. Skitbottom would pay me…

I arrived back at my office around 4:30,, put on the coffee pot and
made myself a peanut butter and sardine sandwich,, (no pickles) it
was going to be a long night…The coffee flavored bourbon set fire
to my tonsils as always,, that’s the way I like it,, I only had six
cups tho,, didn’t want to lose my edge… Besides bourbon is
expense and I didn’t know when I’d be paid…After viewing
Mrs. Skitbottoms’ photo for a couple of hours and making
14 color copies for my private files,, I decide to head down to the
local Gin joints to see if I could get any information about the
cabaña boy or Mrs. Skitbottom…
It was about 9:00 when I arrived at Jimmys’,, the place was
crowded as usual,, I knew most of the drunken cops in there,,
Jimmy as always put my drinks on my tab,, don’t know how much
longer he’s going to do that,, it must be quite a bill by now…
What I don’t need at this moment is for his friend Quido to help
me find a reason to pay my bar bill…I showed Mrs. Skitbottoms’
photo around the joint,, no one had any information about her
whereabouts or about the cabaña boy…They did have a lot of
comments on how to feed the parrot tho…I’ll have to look into that
after I find Mrs. Skitbottom…A couple of hours later I returned to
my office,, I’d hit every Gin joint within a four block
area of my office,, no one had any information that I could use…
The comments about feeding the parrot were enough to keep my
interest in this case stiff through out the night…

I’d followed every clue I could find about the missing
Mrs. Skitbottom,, for two weeks I drove up and down the
California coast,, stopping at every beach to search for
Mrs. Skitbottom among the sun tanned and lotioned blondes lying
on the beach,, hoping I could find her…I knew she could of dyed
her hair so I had to make sure she wasn’t there by taking pictures
of all the thong wearing pickle warmers lying on the beach,,
it was rough work,, but it was just part of the job…
I found it strange tho,, that done of them wanted to become the
next Ex-Mrs. Sam Edaps…
I also investigated every strip bar along Ventura Boulevard,,
carefully stuffing Hamiltons into the garters of the naked strippers,,
looking intently for that parrot tattoo.. I noticed a lot of bunny
tattoos but no parrots…Life as a private eye can be hard work
with long boring tedious hours sometimes,, its just the way it is…
Its what I love about this job…

About two weeks later I received a phone call from
Mr. Skitbottoms’ butler Clevies,, saying that
Mrs. Skitbottom had returned and my services would no longer
be required…Mrs. Skitbottom had forgotten to tell her husband
that she would be in Aruba for the month on a Greenpeace dolphin
watching expedition,, that’s what she told her husband anyway…
No word on the cabaña boy…
I immediately drove over to Mr. Skitbottoms’ estate and handed
my bill to Clevies,, I was hoping to get paid that day,, but Clevies
informed me that Mr. and Mrs. Skitbottom had flown off to the
Rivera on a second honeymoon and would be gone for about
three months…
I have a feeling that I’m not going to get paid... I wonder if the
Enquirer will pay me for the photo of Mrs. Skitbottom…............